--- date: '2026-07-01' title: Next chapter is here tags: --- I've remained silent for a while. After 6 months, I feel like this is the right time to share this piece as a smaller life update from my side. This way, I also want to honor importance of staying true to myself. I had hoped the reality would look different today, but as I've learned in my life a few times already, it rarely meets ones own expectations. Let's talk about how my Pathless Path evolves in 2026. --- ## A new job It's here. My personal journey has brought me another job. This was needed to make ends meet. Very grounding experience to be honest. Let me share a fun fact: during the 5 years since my graduation, I've been 20 months without stable income so far, which represents 1/3 of my work time. As it appears to me, that may not be enough. The percentage here is probably right if somebody wants to have something on their own (let's say a business), but the allocation needs to keep happening over longer time horizon. It's a long game and I am here for it. What is the job you may ask yourself. And let me tell you that it's kinda cool to be honest. I work for a big corporation now called [Deutsche Telekom](https://telekom.com). It's the biggest telco provider by revenue in Europe. That's the serious part. The cool part is that I am building a greenfield project in the company. That's something I am already familiar with thanks to my past experience with [startups](https://edi.eco), [bootstrapped products and brand building](https://fwt.wtf). So yes, I think the company can leverage some part of me there for sure. ## Where is the Pathless Path I love Paul Millerd and his framing of work through the lens of [Pathless Path](https://pathlesspath.com). Question I keep asking myself these days is where it is for me now that I am employed in a big corpo. This certainly wasn't my dream and if you look at my past, that only confirms it. My understanding of Paul's track is that thank's to his relocation to Taiwan from US, he was able to dramatically decrease economical pressure. He came from consulting sector and became high earner quite early in his career. It's good for him, isn't it. He took the risk and found something deeper along the way. He can take on some occasional gigs here and there to financially sustain himself and his family. Ideally, if clients are based in US, billed with a US-ish rate. So what I want to tell by this is that seeing the full picture is crucial. Pursuing Pathless Path means different things for different people. For me, it means I remained in my dream location (Tatra Mountains region in Slovakia btw), and kept building from my savings. ## What's next My new role at this corpo is a balancing act. I was transparent about this during the interviews and I am transparent about it here again. I needed to stabilize, and this decision generally has had a good effect on me during the 6 months so far. However, the bottleneck is that there is little creative energy left for pushing [free with tech](https://fwt.wtf) forward. I keep adding focus points / todos to my journal, but I fail at exectuion / iteration. I've learned it's tough to have something alongside a full-time role. Previously, when I was building [edi](https://edi.eco), I had full capacity for 8 months before landing a part-time contract role. This allowed me to keep building what I wanted over the longer horizon. With [fwt.](https://fwt.wtf), I started with full throttle again during the first whole year (full 12 months). But here I am, full-time in a market disrupted by AI that does not leave so many open options left anymore. I gotta adjust. ## It's phases If I learned anything during this 5 year period since my graduation, it's this: whenever you feel the urge to create something, just do it. Go full throttle if you need to. But there has to be an artifact at the end of this burst of energy concluded by a reflection. The material is very useful for another iteration. Each one serves the next. I know there is another one coming and I am preparing for it now, internally. It's just a question of time. I will wake up to this wave and know it's the time right away. So what's the next chapter about? It's continuous art of self-awareness, balance and the process of creation. Keep the flow and enjoy the ride. That's what it's been since the start. I can recall precisely the moment I decided to leave my first full-time job after graduation at the agency 3 years ago. It was naive, but it was pure. The same way happened to me during transition after a layoff from startup 1,5 years ago. That's when [free with tech](https://fwt.wtf) was born. These are 2 artifacts, each receiving 10 months of my full attention on an average. These artifacts are dear to my heart and I know they will shape my next steps in life. In the end, it's all about curiosity, energy and purpose. If these three are present in equation, all positive, then it's obvious call to make. --- © 2026 [Samuel Pitonak](https://samuelpitonak.com/about.md). All rights reserved.